In the city of As-Suwayda, Southern Syria, a number of young men and women, students of Science and Agriculture Faculty, have launched an initiative under the title “Ideas and Hands” seeking the rehabilitation of the faculty’s gardens and cultivating them with plants that professors use as teaching samples.

However, the idea has developed into a volunteering team that holds the name “Go Green”. The team assumed the responsibility for raising an environmental awareness among the people and the rehabilitation of public facilities and parks following an academic and scientific method.

The team, basically, consists of five members, among whom the tasks are divided according to a planned structure. Many goals have brought them together, of which is the scientific maintenance of gardens according to the criteria they learned at school helped by engineers from the faculty. The team’s activities varied, and the number of the members reached 130 volunteers, as one of the members has told Enab Baladi, refusing to reveal his name.

Funding and Security Approval

In the beginning, the team had such a difficult time in relation to getting the dean or the head of the security department’s permission. Similarly, according to the volunteer, it struggled to get funded, for the “Ideas and Hands” initiative is implemented with the financial support of the local community’s individuals and economic entities after the team managed to issue a security approval and set up a plan and a budget.

He pointed out that the second “Go Green” project, funded, will start from a different place, expressing the team’s readiness to study and implement any project proposed with the objective to develop the governorate.

He also mentioned the team’s need for financial and in-kind support, focusing on the importance of being adopted by a sponsor or an official entity.

The volunteer has also said that the team is welcomed by the target community, and some of the people have demanded that the volunteers keep working even if hindered by certain people.

Enab Baladi (EB) is an independent Syrian media organization that was founded in 2011. EB offers 24-hour news coverage through its multilingual interactive websites, and it publishes a weekly newspaper that covers Syrian political, social.